| 3rd October - That ear-piercing ring you hear in a restaurant
might not be somebody who forgot to set their cell phone to
vibrate.
A new service called Mobile Manager, from Synchronica, can
remotely make a Windows Mobile-based handset emit an "annoying
and embarrassing high-pitched wail," so it can be found
after it has been stolen or misplaced.
Synchronica is a U.K.-based vendor of mobile-device management
tools that aims to help victims of cell phone theft to strike
back, according to a company statement sent Monday.
Thousands of mobile phones are stolen every month, according
to Synchronica. If these are smart phones, they can contain
sensitive information such as e-mail messages and computer
files, potentially causing embarrassing data leaks.
Synchronica's mobile-phone management product can remotely
lock and wipe data from Windows-based phones as soon as their
owners report the loss. Companies can also turn on the "Synchronica
Scream" feature.
"On average, it takes only 30 seconds for someone to
notice that their phone is missing, compared to an hour for
a wallet or purse," according to Synchronica. As a result,
victims should be able to hear their phones scream out for
them.
Devices don't have to be lost or stolen to expose sensitive
data. Engineers at McLean, Va.-based Trust Digital, another
mobile-security company, recently bought 10 smart phones on
eBay and were able to recover 24,000 pages of data from nine
of the gadgets, some of which were sold by employees of major
corporations. The same kind of test is often done on used hard-disk
drives.
"The salvaged data included everything from personal
banking and tax information to corporate sales activity notes
to even former corporate client records, product roadmaps,
contact address books, computer passwords, and other private,
competitive and highly damaging material," according
to a Trust Digital e-mail sent Tuesday. The company plans
to announce its findings on Wednesday.
Synchronica sells its Mobile Manager product to operators
and businesses. The product works with Windows Mobile 2003,
Pocket PC Phone Edition, and Windows Mobile 5. Support for
Symbian is underway. Trust Digital's Mobile Edge product has
similar features, though its Web site doesn't list a "scream"
feature.
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